OS X Mavericks: Learn trackpad and mouse gestures

Learn trackpad and mouse gestures

Gestures offer you a smart, intuitive way to work with your Mac. When you use a Magic Mouse, Magic Trackpad, or a Multi-Touch trackpad on a portable Mac, you can use gestures—such as click, tap, pinch, and swipe—to zoom in on documents, browse through music or webpages, rotate photos, and much more.

With OS X, you’ll enjoy even more fluid and realistic gesture responses, including rubber-band scrolling, zooming, and full-screen swiping. Here are some things you can do with gestures:

To open Launchpad, pinch close with four or five fingers.

To look up a word in the dictionary, tap it with three fingers.

To switch from one full-screen app to another, swipe left or right with three or four fingers.

To see how to perform gestures, customize how gestures work, and set options for your trackpad or mouse, open Trackpad or Mouse preferences.

Set up your Magic Mouse

Magic Mouse is an advanced point-and-click mouse that lets you click and double-click anywhere on its Multi-Touch surface. The Multi-Touch area covers the whole surface of Magic Mouse, and the mouse itself is the button. Scroll in any direction with one finger, swipe through webpages and photos with two fingers, and click or double-click anywhere.

Here are some ways you can work with your Magic Mouse:

To scroll in any direction or pan 360 degrees, move one finger along the Magic Mouse surface.

To enlarge items on your screen, hold down the Control key and scroll with one finger.

To move through pages in Safari or browse photos in iPhoto, use two fingers to swipe left or right.

To customize how your Magic Mouse works, use Mouse preferences.

Set up your Magic Trackpad

Magic Trackpad is a Multi-Touch trackpad designed to work with your Mac desktop computer. It supports a full set of gestures and gives you a whole new way to control and interact with what’s on your screen.

Here are some ways you can work with your Magic Trackpad:

To scroll in any direction, swipe two fingers along the Multi-Touch surface.

To rotate an image, twist your thumb and forefinger clockwise or counterclockwise.

To move through pages, swipe left or right with two fingers.

To see how to perform gestures and customize how your Magic Trackpad works, use Trackpad preferences.

Set up your trackpad

The Multi-Touch trackpad is the most natural way to interact with what’s on your screen, and the smooth glass surface gives you plenty of room for gestures. The entire Multi-Touch trackpad is a button, so you can click anywhere on the trackpad. Pinch to zoom in and out, swipe to flip through photos, rotate to adjust an image, and much more.

To see how to perform gestures and customize how your Multi-Touch trackpad works, open Trackpad preferences.